- Outfits: I spent a good amount of hours sewing my two skirts and bonnet with a young women's leader. She helped me out a lot! I was excited to wear my pioneer outfit even though I knew the many layers would be really hot. My leader had some fabric that she saved from her great grandmother. She offered to let me use it. I loved how the skirts and bonnet turned out! The fabric made it look even more pioneer-y. Thank you to Sister Patterson for all of your help! And thank you to Kathy Russell for letting me borrow a few shirts and things!
- Families: When we got to the Trek site we were divided up into our families. A girl in my family was sick and wasn't able to make it so we ended up with 3 girls, 4 boys and our Ma & Pa. Brother and Sister Ball were fantastic! I had already met them a few years ago so I was really excited to be in their family. Both of them are so kind and very funny! Pa liked making up songs about all of the dust in our noses :P He made up so many jokes along the way. My family was just awesome! I only knew one of my sisters but soon got to know my other one. Both of them were a lot of fun to be around! I had never met two of my brothers but I had seen them at school. Nick was also a silly one!
- Walking: Where to start on the walking... well.... we walked. And walked. And walked. And walked some more. We walked a total of 20 miles in the heat! As we pulled our handcart I kept thinking about how miserable the heat was but a thought would quickly pop into my head about how miserable the pioneers must have been in the freezing cold! I admit I would rather be cold, but I was grateful that we weren't shivering the whole way. I think that would have made it even harder on us. I was lucky to not have gotten any blisters on my feet like many others did. I only had a small one at the very end and it wasn't very painful. I did get one on my hand from the handcart but it wasn't a big deal. And! Guess what! I didn't get sunburned!! For those of you that know me you know me I just fry in the sun. I was sure to keep putting lots of sunscreen on and it worked! My bonnet kept my neck, ears and face in the shade the entire time. I actually got a tan! This NEVER happens! I honestly can't remember the last time I was tan and not a lobster. Huge blessing!
- Dust: I am allergic to dust. Let's just put this one there. I get really bad allergies to dust so I came prepared with allergy pills! However, the second day I forgot to take one until we were already walking - when the allergies kicked in. The wind was blowing really bad all that day. We were going through really fine dirt and a lot of us were sneezing. By the time the trek was over I had dust in places I never thought dust would be! TMI right? No worries, I am talking about inside my ears and all down my back. I don't think it helped that we were all sweating like crazy, either. I'm just glad my sunscreen smelled good! ;)
- Ancestors: I couldn't find one of my ancestors to represent on this trip. But the same leader that helped me sew my clothes said that I could walk for one of hers! Her name is Elizabeth White Stewart. Her family came from England when she was just 16 years old. Her father died when she was only 5 and had a few siblings. Her family were converts to the church. They spent 5 weeks on a ship coming over to America. When they arrived they were told they had to walk 4 miles to camp. They didn't know they had to walk all that way until they got there. When the weather was fair they would walk between 15-25 miles per day! This really touched me. We only walked 9 miles on the first day, which was the most we did in one day. We walked 20 miles in three days! It is beyond me how they were able to do that in just one. They truly had faith in their God and they KNEW He would help them, and that He did.
- Woman's Pull: When we reached the hardest part of the trail we were all gathered together so that a stake leader could talk to us. He quickly told the priesthood to come with him and start walking down another trail. They had no handcarts, so we knew that we were going to be the ones taking them. We were told that we wouldn't see them for a while and none of us (besides the leaders) knew how hard the upcoming trail would be. We could already see that we had to pull all of the handcarts up the hill, and it was covered in deep, fine dirt. We all pitched in and helped each other get the carts up as fast as we could. It was hard, but what a great experience! And here comes the best part. As we continued to pull the carts the dirt got much deeper and the dust was horrible. You couldn't see your feet because we were up to our calves in dirt! The trail had just been plowed and someone told us there were 7 more layers of dirt added to it. The carts obviously sank with us. We continued down the trail when we looked up and saw the all of priesthood! All of them had their hats over their hearts and they were crying. Later we learned that they could see us pulling the carts by ourselves. It really touched me how much they really cared about all of us women. I had no idea this would impact them so much, but it really did. They care about us so much! It was then that I realized how true and caring their hearts are. One day I will marry a worthy priesthood holder who holds the same respect for me.
- River Crossing: This was one of my favorite parts of the trek. I was nervous at first but it really wasn't bad at all. The water was cool and our wet clothing cooled us off. My family really didn't have much struggle getting through the water. When we parked our carts I went back over to watch the others coming. I was amazed at how many of the priesthood bearers went back for the women. Again I was shown at how much they really do care. Some of the girls were disappointed that they didn't get wet, but they weren't complaining about the kindness of the men in our stake. One of the Ma's said that she was grateful for her husband, who carried her across, even though she did want to go in the water. She then said to look at it in the perspective of the pioneers coming across the plains. The men showed so much respect to the women! They did all they could to help. Many of you are familiar with the story of the 4 men who continued to walk back into the freezing river to help others cross. ALL of them lived with the effects of carrying people through the icy river for the rest of their lives. This story touched me even more when I saw the men in my stake doing all they could to help the women around them.
- Meals: We were fed so well on this Trek! Our first evening we arrived at camp two hours early. It was nice to relax and chat with our families. My family played a game called "Don't Eat Pete!" with a TON of M&M's that our Pa had brought. They weren't melted but they were soft and it was a great treat after walking for so long! That night we ate stew and salad for dinner, along with another side that escapes me. Chocolate chip cookie for dessert! In the morning we had french toast, ham and eggs for breakfast. Lunch was a sandwich with chips and some fruit. Dinner the second night was taco salad! Yummy! Cobbler was for dessert. That night we also had a little surprise. About the time that everyone was finished eating and starting to clean up dinner, a biplane started flying pretty close to our camp. It circled around a few times and suddenly it dropped something! The plane came around again and dropped yet another something. We discovered it was boxes of FatBoy ice cream sandwiches! YUM! The next day we had pancakes, ham and eggs. For lunch... a stake leader talked to us about the rations of flour that the pioneers ate. He gave us all a 4 oz. sack of flour and told us that was our lunch for the day. Some people believed him, but many of us knew he didn't mean it. It was really eye-opening to hold that in your hand and think that that was all they ate for an entire day! We actually had a piece of bread and an apple for lunch. It wasn't much but it was really good. They did provide us with butter and honey butter, though. For dinner we had hotdogs and hamburgers with chips and fruit. We also got another chocolate chip cookie. Root beer was served instead of water but I held strong and wouldn't drink it even though I really wanted to! (New Year's goal was no soda for an entire year.)
- Testimony Meeting(s): On the second (last) night we had a stake testimony meeting. Some of the leaders played music and sang. After the musical numbers it was open for any of the youth to come up and bear their testimonies. There were so many of us that wanted to go up a stake leader had to tell us that no one else could come up because it was getting so late. Most of my family wanted to go up but we didn't have the chance to. For devotional with our family that night we decided to do our own little testimony meeting. We sat in a close circle and you could definitely feel the Spirit! I loved my family and the testimonies that we shared. It was such a precious moment to me. These people were there for me, and I was there for them. We all worked together and made our hard task doable! Thank you for the great experience guys!
I am glad that I chose to go on Trek this year! I was only a couple months too young to go on the last one four years ago. I will remember this experience for the rest of my life. I learned so much more than I had originally thought I would. Even though I didn't wear the name of my ancestor I could feel Elizabeth with me. I know she was happy that I decided to represent her.
What an awesome experience!
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